Excuses.
I know I have written about them before. They are everywhere, telling us to stay in bed for another 30 minutes because it is dark and cold outside, convincing us we should eat the giant chocolate chip cookie in the lunchroom because we were good all morning or that we should have the French fries with our burger and a second beer because it is Friday and we worked hard all week.
Here is the thing -- all of these choices are fine if you are not trying to lose weight but where I constantly become frustrated each week is when my clients and friends have the exact same conversation with me about how they want to lose weight and just cannot seem to do it. As soon as I begin to discuss what needs to be done to see the results they want (stop drinking, make healthy food choices, increase their cardio, get more sleep) they have every excuse as to why they cannot make that happen (a party coming up that they have to drink at, they go out for lunch for work every day and it is impossible to eat healthy at a restaurant or they are too busy to do more exercise nor do they have time to sleep). This drives me crazy.
If you want something you have to work at making it happen. Just like you cannot expect to show up at the start line of a marathon expecting to finish it if you have not done a single run prior you cannot expect the scale to move if sacrifices are not being made. And the important word here is SACRIFICE -- something that is difficult to give up but needs to be done to see results.
If you do not have time to exercise more you need to make time and get up earlier or watch less television. You need to use your time more efficiently such as working out on your lunch break, even if it is for only 15 minutes. You need to start each day with a healthy breakfast and take time to pack healthy snacks to bring with you to work so you are not tempted with the pastries at your local cafe. You need to brush your teeth right after dinner to help prevent you from snacking before bed. You need to stick with 1 glass of wine on a Friday night, not a bottle and you need to order the small salad with dressing on the side, not the French fries.
No one can do it for you as you are the one making the choices so whatever choice you make expect the result that goes along with it.
Attached - Minka Kelly goes for a smoothie.
